MPs' expenses: John Austin claims £35,000 for flats 11 miles from home

John Austin, a Labour MP, claimed more than £10,000 in expenses for the
redecoration of his London flat, which was 11 miles from his main home,
before selling it for a profit.

John Austin is due to retire at the next electionPhoto: UPPA

By Jon Swaine and Christopher Hope

2:14PM BST 18 May 2009

He made £30,000 on the sale and then bought a new flat 1.5 miles away, claiming £10,000 in stamp duty and charges incurred during the move, and a further £15,000 on a new bathroom, kitchen, carpets and appliances.

Mr Austin, the MP for Erith and Thamesmead, is retiring at the next election. His claims represent one of the clearest cases so far of an MP profiting by “flipping” their expenses claims to a new second home.

They also highlight the fact that MPs just outside London can claim as much as those in the Scottish highlands, despite being able to commute to Parliament in under an hour.

In 2005, Mr Austin claimed £9,520 for a new bathroom, £1,900 for repainting and £750 for other repairs at the first flat, in Southwark, south-east London, which was designated as his second home. He also claimed up to £535 per month for the interest on his mortgage.

The MP, who is a member of the socialist Campaign group, then sold the flat for £140,000 in March 2006. He had bought it for £110,000 three years earlier.

He then bought a £225,000 replacement about 1.5 miles away from the original flat, and designated this as his second home. This allowed him to claim about £10,000 in stamp duty and other charges incurred during the move.

The two flats are both about 11 miles along the south of the River Thames from his terraced constituency house in Belvedere, Kent, which he designates as his main home.

It is unclear how much he paid for this house when he bought it in 1999. The house opposite was sold for £150,000 in July 2006.

After moving in to his new flat, Mr Austin immediately informed Parliamentary authorities that he would need to increase his mortgage - the interest on which is paid by taxpayers - to fund work on his new flat.

Re-mortgaging is only permitted for essential maintenance work. An official agreed to Mr Austin's re-mortgage. He began claiming £760 per month in mortgage interest from expenses.

Mr Austin then also claimed £15,000 for a new bathroom, a new kitchen, new carpets and a range of home appliances directly through his expenses as well.

He wrote to the fees office: “Some renovation, repair and redecoration is needed, including replacing carpets, providing curtains etc for which I understand costs can be claimed as well as ‘white goods’ ... kitchen furniture and fittings and bathroom tiles and some fittings need replacement.”

In the past year he has claimed for a £250 “illuminated mirrored cabinet” from John Lewis, a £300 Beko fridge freezer and a £399 Philips LCD television.

He paid £3,385 for the flat’s new kitchen, more than £6,000 for a new bathroom and £1,910 for new carpets, including “wool touch mink” in some rooms. In all he has claimed more than £133,000 in second home expenses since 2001.

Mr Austin said: “The move was for a valid reason and I do not think it inappropriate for costs associated with the move to be claimed from the allowance. I checked with the authorities that it was reasonable to leave behind the kitchen units, fridge/freezer and washing machine.

"These items were approved in advance by the Fees office and very modest purchases were made, at considerably less cost than the guidelines.”

Mr Austin’s Commons seat, which is one of Labour’s safest, was recently at the centre of a party row.

Allies of Tony Blair, the former prime minister, wanted Georgia Gould, the 23-year-old daughter of the New Labour polling guru Lord Gould, to replace Mr Austin.

However many local activists said they resented having the Oxford graduate “parachuted in”. On Saturday Miss Gould lost the vote for the candidacy to Teresa Pearce, 54, a long-time local activist.